Church Politics and the Genocide in Rwanda

CHURCH POLITICS AND THE GENOCIDE IN RWANDA

BY

TIMOTHY LONGMAN

(Vassar College)

ABSTRACT

Christian churches were deeply implicated in the 1994 genocide of ethnic Tutsi in Rwanda. Churches were a major site for massacres, and many Christians participated in the slaughter, including church personnel and lay leaders. Church involvement in the genocide can be explained in part because of the historic link between church and state and the acceptance of ethnic discrimination among church officials. In addition, just as political officials chose genocide as a means of reasserting their authority in the face of challenges from a democracy movement and civil war, struggles over power within Rwanda's Christian churches led some church leaders to accept the genocide as a means of eliminating challenges to their own authority within the churches.

For three months in 1994, the Christian churches of Rwanda served

as the country's killing fields. When ethnic and political violence ignited in the country following the death of President Juvenal Habyarimana in a mysterious plane crash on April 6, thousands of members of the

minority Tutsi ethnic group sought refuge in Catholic and Protestant

parishes. But death squads surrounded the churches and systematically

slaughtered the people within, tossing grenades through church win-

dows, firing into the crowds with rifles, then finishing off the survivors

with machetes, pruning hooks, and knives. One human rights group asserts that, 'more Rwandese citizens died in churches and parishes than anywhere else' (African Rights 1995: 865).

Less than a decade later, few visible reminders of the violence remain.

The bricks of some churches are still pocked by bullet holes, and in a

few places the blood stains will not wash off the walls and floor, but

the bodies have been buried, the buildings repaired, and on Sunday mornings the churches are once again filled with worshipers singing,

praying, and reading the Bible. For some Rwandans, however, the

country's churches stand as reminders of the violence that decimated

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their families. The image of bodies piled at the altar does not easily fade from the minds of those who survived the carnage, and, for some, churches can never again serve as a place of refuge. As one young woman told me, 'I was Presbyterian bcfore the war. But I cannot go back to church now. Not after what happened there. Not after what

church people did.''

In the aftermath of the Rwandan genocide, many people inside and

outside the country have struggled to comprehend the involvement of

Rwanda's churches in the violence. Many Christians in particular have

wondered how such carnage could have taken place in one of Africa's

most Christian countries, how the population could have become so

willingly involved in such deplorable acts in a country where more than

90 per cent of the population were members of Catholic or Protestant

churches. As critics of Rwanda's churches have pointed out, not only did church buildings become the sites of massacres, but most of the

killers were Christian, and even some pastors and pricsts participated in the slaughter. Critics have condemned Rwanda's church leaders for

supporting the genocidal government and failing to denounce the vio-

lence (cf. Africa Rights 1995; Zarembo 1995; Des Forges 1999: 245-

248). As Alison Des Forges (1999) states, 'church authorities left the

way clear for officials, politicians, and propagandists to assert that the

slaughter actually met with God's favor' (246). As I will attempt to explain in this article, understanding the involve-

ment of Rwanda's churches in the genocide requires looking not sim-

ply at the relationship between the churches and the state but at the

nature of churches as institutions. Christian churches in Rwanda were

not only closely allied with the state and involved in battles over state

power, but they were themselves important arenas of political struggle. Churches had substantial resources and significant influence in the

society. They could confer high status on individuals and provide opportunities for a select few to enrich themselves. As a result, the contest

to gain power and influence within the churches was often quite intense,

and, from the beginnings of Christian mission in Rwanda, these power

struggles involved ethnicity as an important factor. If churches became

implicated in Rwanda's genocide, it was not simply because church

leaders hoped to avoid opposing their governmental allies but because

ethnic conflict was itself an integral part of Christianity in Rwanda.

Christians could kill without obvious qualms of conscience, even in the

church, because Christianity as they had always known it had been a

religion defined by struggles for power, and ethnicity had always been

at the base of those struggles.' .

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Political Analysis of Religion

Political scientists have generally approached the analysis of religious

groups in one of two ways. Scholars focusing on social conflict have

commonly looked at religion as an aspect of identity that defines the

individual as part of a social group and thus mediates the individual's

relationship to other social groups and to the state. In certain places and at certain times, religious identities become politically salient and

are grounds for political mobilization and contestation. While conflicts

in places such as Northern Ireland, Bosnia, and India may have little

to do with theological issues, the polarization of identity along lines of

religious community and the struggle between communities for political power is at the heart of the confrontations. Much literature on

genocide approaches religion from this perspective, seeing it as an

attribute used to define members of certain groups as a social 'other'

and to justify their exclusion from society (cf. Beuken and Kuschel

1997; Ludden 1996; Sells 1996; Melson 1992; Zukier 1996). In Rwanda, however, religious affiliation is not a significant organ-

izer of group identity. Ethnicity and region are far more significant as ascriptive identifiers, and religious affiliations do not reinforce but

rather cut across these lines of division. Christian churches did play an

important role historically in helping to define ethnic identities in

Rwanda, but religion itself is not an important identity.' Conversion

from one Christian church to another is relatively common and uncom-

plicated, and many families contain members of more than one church

and may also include Muslims or people who continue to adhere only to indigenous religions. In contrast to genocides in other contexts, Tutsi

in Rwanda were never ostracized for their religious beliefs, practices, or background nor were they isolated as infidels.' 4

A second common approach to religion within political science treats

religious groups as interest groups, much like labor unions or women's

federations, in which like-minded people come together to increase their

political power. This approach defines politics narrowly as the struggle over state power and regards religious groups as politically significant

only insofar as they influence state personnel, institutions, and policies. This approach to religion dominates the pluralist analysis of religious

groups in western societies and is found as well in much of the recent

literature on civil society in Africa and elsewhere (cf. Fowler 1985; Walshe 1995; Haynes 1996; Constantin and Coulon 1997; Monga 1996).

While more useful than the identity approach, this pluralist approach is not sufficient for understanding the involvement of Rwanda's churches

166

in the 1994 genocide. Religious groups in Rwanda clearly did act as

interest groups. Church leaders were prominent public figures with con-

siderable influence in the political arena, from the national to the local

level. The leaders of the Catholic, Anglican, Presbyterian, and Baptist churches were all close associates of President Habyarimana and his

government, and local pastors and priests were often closely allied with

local burgomasters and communal councilors. The churches clearly

played an important part over a long period in helping to organize

support for the regime and adding to its legitimacy. At the same time, national church leaders were not directly involved

in the planning and execution of the genocide. Research does not

include among the members of the core group of military officers and

government officials who planned the genocide even the Catholic arch-

bishop, well known for his anti-Tutsi attitudes and his cozy relation-

ship with the regime (cf. Des Forges 1999: 96-140; Prunier 1995: 166-

174). While some local level church officials were directly involved in

preparing and carrying out the genocide in their communities, most

critics have condemned the churches not for their actions but rather

for their inaction, for 'not doing more to halt the bloodshed' (Shillinger 2000). Churches arc accused of 'sins of omission', failing to act in the

face of evil, rather than actively supporting or facilitating the genocide. As I will attempt to show, however, Rwanda's Christian churches

were implicated in the violence not simply because they failed to pre- vent it nor even because they legitimized the regime that carried out

the genocide. Instead, churches helped make genocide possible by mak-

ing ethnic violence understandable and acceptable to the population. What Doris L. Bergen writes about the churches in relationship to the

Holocaust in Germany can be applied to Rwanda as well:

Christianity ... did play a critical role, not perhaps in motivating the top decision makers, but in making their commands comprehensible and tolerable to the rank- and-file-the people who actively carried out the measures against the Jews as well as those who passively condoned their implementation.... Christian anti- Judaism was certainly not the sole factor, but without it, the Holocaust could not have occurred as it did (Bergen 1995: 329-330).

Similarly, while churches were not the chief organizers of the Rwandan

genocide, their long practice of teaching obedience to authority and of

engaging in ethnic politics made it possible for Rwandans to ignore the

principle of sanctuary and participate in the killing of Tutsi without

feeling that their actions were in conflict with church teachings. In fact, the organizers of the death squads in many local communities included

not only prominent lay church leaders but sometimes priests, pastors,

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Catholic brothers, catechists, and other church employees, and the fact

that death squads attended mass before going out to kill or that killers

paused during the massacres to pray at the altar5 suggests that people felt their work was consistent with church teachings. Far from being mere passive bystanders, Christian churches provided essential support for the slaughter.

To understand how Rwanda's churches became so profoundly implicated in the 1994 genocide requires, I contend, analyzing Christian

churches as inherently political institutions. Rather than treating the

state as the center of all political action and assessing only the role that

churches played in influencing state policies (or being influenced by

them), churches should be regarded as political institutions in their own

right. Naomi Chazan has noted that we need an understanding of politics in which the state

is no longer viewed as the sole magnet of social, economic, and political exchange. It constitutes merely one of many possible foci of social action.... Politics, power and control are not of necessity coterminous with the state. Politics, the competition for access and control over resources, takes place well beyond the narrow public domain in African countries. Power--the capacity to control resources- and authority-the right to do so-may legitimately be vested in local social structures as well (Chazan 1988: 123).

If we accept Harold Lasswell's (1936) classic definition of politics as

the struggle over 'Who gets what, when, how,' then churches in Rwanda

are clearly political institutions, because they play a major role in dis-

tributing resources. With important international connections and an

ability to raise funds internally, churches have substantial wealth to dis-

tribute, and those who have held positions of power in Rwanda's

churches have used their ability to determine who gets jobs, scholar-

ships, development assistance, and other benefits to advance their personal interests. The competition for power within the churches has

involved all the intrigue, rival alliances, patrimonial relationships, and

ethnic discrimination of other Rwandan political institutions. Not only did the historic political engagement of churches help to impart moral

sanction to arguments for a 'final solution' to the 'Tutsi problem', but

the genocide itself figured into the struggles for power within the

churches.

Churches as Political Institutions in the Colonial Era

Three key principles established during the colonial period continue

to shape the nature of church social engagement within Rwanda.'' First,

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from their arrival in Rwanda in 1900, missionaries sought to make

churches important actors in the country's political struggles. The lead-

ers of the Missionaries of Africa (better known as White Fathers), the

dominant Catholic missionary order in Rwanda and Burundi, believed

that sympathetic state leadership was necessary to facilitate the con-

version of the population. Thus, they initially urged their mission-

aries to do everything within their power to appease both local chiefs

and the royal court and to focus their conversion efforts on the elite

(Kalibwami 1991: 174-181; Linden and Linden 1977: 29-30). Once the

focus on elite evangelization had begun to bear fruit in the 1920s, the

missionaries moved beyond merely appeasing existing political leader-

ship and began actively to promote the selection of Catholic candidates

as chiefs. In 1931, the White Fathers were the driving force behind

the dethronement of King Musinga and his replacement by his pro- Catholic son, Rudahigwa, which sent a powerful message to the population that affiliation with the Catholic Church was a key to gaining

political power. The elite began to convert in large numbers, and the

masses soon followed. Protestant missionaries, wishing to emulate

Catholic success, sought similar influence in the selection of chiefs, and

Protestantism soon became an ancillary route to social advancement

that also served to attract adherents (Linden and Linden 1977: 152-219; Des Forges 1972). Christian churches were thus established during the

colonial period not simply as allies of the government but as important players in contestation for state power.

A second principle that can be traced back to the origins of Christianity in Rwanda is the active engagement of churches in ethnic politics.

Ethnicity was an important element that affected missionary under-

standings of exactly who should be considered elite and, thus, who

should be targeted for conversion. The missionaries who arrived in

Rwanda and Burundi understood the local populations according to

then contemporary conceptions of race and nationality that viewed the

world's population as divided into neatly defined, hierarchically ranked

groups with specific innate characteristics. Ignoring the importance of

region, clan, and other social divisions in Rwanda and Burundi, mis-

sionaries considered Hutu, Tutsi, and Twa as the most consequential social identities and understood them to be rigid racial categories.' They

regarded the Twa as a 'pygmoid' group, less intelligent and more 'sav-

age' ; the Hutu as Bantu, simple, solid and hardworking; and the Tutsi

as Hamitic, more closely related to Europeans and naturally more intel-

ligent.8 Although we know today that the missionaries' conclusions about Rwandan society were inaccurate, because they misunderstood the nature

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and origins of the identities that they saw as ethnic and racial, their

observations nevertheless profoundly influenced subsequent European

engagement in Rwanda and Burundi and ultimatcly reshaped social

reality in the two countries. Ethnic labels gained significance in practice as they became a basis for German and Belgian colonial admin-

istration. The implementation of indirect rule and the centralization of

the political systems, which eliminated Hutu chiefs and autonomous

Hutu kingdoms, eflectively excluded Hutu from political opportunity, while the listing of ethnic labels on identity cards issued to all residents

served to eliminate the previous flexibility in identity (Lc:marchand 1970:

63-79; Newbury 1988: 23-179; Prunier 1995: 5-40). More significant for understanding the later involvement of churches

in the genocide than their role in influencing the development of Hutu,

Tutsi, and Twa as ethnic identities is the way in which churches accepted

engagement in ethnic politics and discrimination as legitimate. Both

because they saw Tutsi as the established elite who needed to be

appeased and because they believed in the natural superiority of Tutsi, missionaries initially offered educational and employment opportunities

overwhelmingly to Tutsi. As Tutsi themselves entered the priesthood, some used their positions to further advance the interests and prospects of their ethnic group. Most significantly, the court histories written by the priest Alexis Kagame helped justify Tutsi rule over Rwanda (Linden and Linden 1977: 73-185; Rutayisire 1987; Vidal 1991). Following the

Second World War, a new breed of Catholic missionary, influenced by social democratic philosophies, questioned the inequalities in Rwandan

society and began to foster a Hutu 'counter-elite,' providing education

and employment to promising young Hutu. When a peasant uprising in November 1959 drove most Tutsi from political offices, the Hutu

counter-elite fostered by the missionaries stepped out of their church

functions to assume political leadership, including Gregoire Kayibanda, who had served as editor of a Catholic newspaper and leader of a

Catholic consumers' cooperative and went on to become prime minis-

ter, then president (Linden and Lindcn 1977: 220-281; Lemarchand

1970: 119-260). While the 1959 revolution led to a dramatic shift in

the structures of political power in Rwanda, as Hutu assumed nearly all state offices, and marked a partial shift in church support from Tutsi

to Hutu, the basic principles of the churches' participation in political

struggles and engagement in ethnic politics remained consistent.

The third element of the political nature of the churches that can

be traced back to the colonial period is less widely recognized in the

literature. As in most of Africa, Christian missionaries in Rwanda sought

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to attract converts not simply through the power of their message, but

also through various material incentives. Both Catholic and Protestant

missionaries established schools and health centers, introduced new crops and farming techniques, and began money-making projects to attract

public interest. Hence, from the inception of Christianity in Rwanda, local parishes were much more than spiritual centers (Linden and Linden

1977: 33-114; Kalibwami 1991: 171-195; Twagirayesu and van Butselaar

1982: 15-67). Churches possessed substantial independent resources

which they distributed in much the same manner as chiefs, obtaining

support from the population by providing them with consumer goods, seeds, health care, and other amenities.' The spiritual resources of the

churches became increasingly important as well, as people turned to

the churches and their leaders to dispense the powers of healing, protection, and salvation.' People aspired to employment within the churches

as priest, catechist, teacher, or lay leader because it brought not only social status, but also power in the form of influence over the distribu-

tion of resources and opportunities, and as church membership, resources, and activities expanded, the prominence of the parish within local com-

munities grew, as did the competition for power within the churches. In short, churches as they developed in colonial Rwanda were cen-

ters of political contestation where people struggled for influence and

access to resources. Churches had patrimonial structures and factions

that competed for power, and, though church groups were often involved

in struggles over state power, thc status of churches as political insti-

tutions should not be understood exclusively in relationship to the state, because the primary political struggles within the churches concerned

the distribution of power within the churches themselves. In these strug-

gles for power, ethnicity was a major factor from the outset. Tutsi were

given privileged positions in both Catholic and Protestant Churches

and fought to preserve their dominance, but the churches also provided limited opportunities to Hutu at a time when Hutu were excluded

almost entirely from the state sphere. The battle for Hutu empowerment began in the churches, before spreading into a fight for control

of the state, and the struggle over the ethnic distribution of power remained more pronounced in the churches after independence than

in other public spheres.

Church Patrimonialism in Independent Rwanda

Despite the revolution that drove Tutsi from power, the social position of the churches in Rwandan society remained fairly constant after

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independence. Whereas missionaries had been instrumental during the

colonial period in the consolidation of Tutsi power and the replacement of the king, after independence the churches played an important part in the consolidation of Hutu power, and the new president was once again a leader hand-picked by Catholic Church officials. The

church changed its dominant loyalty from Tutsi to Hutu, but it con-

tinued to engage overtly in ethnic politics. While the majority of Catholic

priests and Protestant pastors remained Tutsi, Hutu quickly occupied most church leadership posts. Although a Tutsi was named bishop in

the Catholic Church on the eve of independence, another Tutsi bishop was not installed for more than thirty years, and a similar Hutu mono-

poly on leadership positions developed in the Protestant churches. At

the same time, the churches were among the only public institutions

where Tutsi continued to have a strong presence. Whereas Tutsi were

removed from nearly all government and military posts, they could still

serve in positions in the churches. A paradoxical attitude toward eth-

nicity produced a tension in the churches, since Hutu credited the

churches-particular the Catholic Church-with supporting the Hutu

accession to power and they joined the churches in larger numbers

than ever before, and yet the church that they encountered (their priests and teachers) was Tutsi. When anti-Hutu ethnic violence in Burundi

inspired a backlash against Tutsi in Rwanda in 1973, church schools

and other church institutions were among the primary targets, as Hutu

mobs drove out Tutsi teachers and students whom they accused of pre-

venting the completion of the Hutu revolution (Reyntjens 1985: 499-

509 ; Kalibwami 1991: 539-549)." After Juvenal Habyarimana deposed Kayibanda in a 1973 coup, he

sought to ease ethnic tensions by enforcing a policy of 'equilibrium' that officially limited Tutsi enrollment in schools and public employment to their proportion of the population. In practice, few Tutsi were

allowed in the military or civil service, and the churches remained

among the only possible opportunities for Tutsi who wanted suitable

employment. Yet all of Rwanda's churches remained dominated at the

top by Hutu, and Habyarimana developed a close working relationship with the national leadership of the churches. Until forced to resign by the Vatican in 1985, the Catholic archbishop of Kigali was a member

of the central committee of the ruling party, the Movement Révolutionaire

National pour le Développement (Revolutionary National Movement for

Development, MRND), and he served as the personal confessor of

Habyarimana's wife. The president of the Presbyterian Church served on the regional committee of the ruling party in his home region, and

172

in the Anglican church both the Bishop of Kigali and the Bishop of

Shyira (later named Archbishop) were vocal in their support for the

regime. As a result, while the state effectively quashed ethnic conflict

within its sphere of control (basically by offering protection for Tutsi in exchange for their acquiescence to a circumscribed social position that would appease the Hutu), ethnic tensions within the churches

remained more conspicuous. Tutsi could become pastors and priests, but the most important church offices were not generally open to them.

The most scandalous example of church ethnic discrimination occurred

when the Vatican appointed Felicien Muvara, a respected Tutsi priest and scholar, as bishop in 1988 but he resigned just before being installed,

apparently under pressure from the archbishop who objected to a Tutsi

becoming bishop.'2 A full understanding of political conflicts within the churches, how-

ever, requircs looking beyond the national level to the local parish. As

I have argued elsewhere, 'churches are loosely organized and decentral-

izcd institutions which can be exploited for diverse purposes' (Longman 1998a: 67). While in theory most churches arc highly hierarchical and

centralized institutions, in practice the various manifestations of the

churches function with considerable autonomy, a fact that is particu-

larly apparent at the level of the parish. While the pastors and priests are named by bishops or other national church leaders and can be

moved at will, in practice they have great freedom over the activities

and organization of their parish. In the local community, especially in

rural areas, churches represent an imposing presence, frequently offering more employment and having more resources to distribute than the

state. As a result, priests and pastors are powerful figures, and local

struggles for power may actually center around the church as much as

they do the state.

The historic parish of Save (pronounced where I conducted

field research in 1992-1993 and follow-up research in 1996, can serve

as an example of the breadth of operations of a typical large parish,

many of which are found in the country. The Save parish, located

within walking distance of the city of Butare, had over 45,000 baptized members in 1992, divided into 135 basic Christian communities, sub-

parish-level groups for prayer, Bible study, and community action. The

church supported eleven primary schools, three secondary schools, a

literacy center, a large health center, a nutritional center, and several

economic projects, including a silo for beans and grain. To run these

programs, the church employed a large number of people. The four

parish pricsts and ten catechists dealt primarily with the spiritual affairs

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of the church, including associations for women and youth and several

religious organizations, such as the Legion of Mary. To assist with the

educational and health programs, several orders of brothers and nuns

had monasteries within the parish, with a total of 63 nuns from three

orders and 23 brothers from three orders. The first and largest Rwandan

order of sisters, the Benebikira, was based at Save. The church employed

many lay people as well, particularly as teachers and health workers."

With such extensive programs, so many employees, and the resources

needed to support them (derived from international donors, church

offerings, fees, and some government assistance), the Save parish was

a major source of economic, social, and political opportunity for peo-

ple in the surrounding area. People interviewed from the parish claimed

that they found the church more accessible than the state and thus

were much more likely to turn to the church when they needed assist-

ance. The church is where they went to have their children educated, to curc their illnesses, or to receive aid when times were tough, and it

was where they turned for spiritual strength as well, not only in Sunday mass, but in weekly prayer in their basic communities and in other

church associations. At the same time, while most people turned to the

church merely for assistance in their daily struggle to survive, a small

number were able to use the church to raise substantially their social

status or to enrich themselves. As a result, there was considerable com-

petition for power within the parish. The priest who served as head of

the parish before 1993, the cure, managed to accumulate substantial

personal wealth and employed a number of members of his family in

the parish. The cure, like other priests, maintained his position and the

access to wealth it provided by appointment of the Bishop of Butare, in whose good graces he had to remain to preserve this desirable office. In turn, other people in the parish maintained their positions by pre-

serving good relations with the cure. The parish and each of the basic

communities had a committee to oversee their operation, including the

distribution of economic assistance, academic scholarships, and other

expenditures. While in theory these positions were elected, in practice the cure exercised great influence over who was selected, and those

who served the church, even in a relatively minor position as member

of a basic community council, could use their positions for personal

gain, since they helped to determine who would get economic assist-

ance. The cure, along with other church personnel such as the head

of the Benebikira, school principals, and medical directors, held con-

siderable power to determine who was hired as teachers, secretaries,

nightwatchmen, gardeners, and custodians, to name but a few of the

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numerous paid positions within the parish. In an economy where salaried

employment was extremely difficult to obtain, the ability to hire and

fire was an important source of power. The cure could furthermore

determine whether parishioners were in good standing and thus eligi- ble to have a church marriage or to have their children baptized.

The situation that I am describing is that of a patrimonial structure

in which bishops and other church leaders at the top used their powers of appointment and funding to secure support from subordinates

at the local level. The priests and pastors they appointed to positions were like clients who owed them a debt of gratitude and obedience.

Failing to please their superiors could result in the transfer of clergy to less attractive positions. Yet, within the parishes, the priests and pastors acted in turn as patrons, using their authority and resources to

attract their own clients. A number of variables structured these patrimonial systems, including ethnicity, family, and community of origin, but the systems also depended on loyalty and alliances, and within each

church there developed rival alliances that sought to advance the position of their members.

To understand how the churches ultimately became involved in the

genocide requires recognizing not only the competition for power within

the churches but also the ways in which the patrimonial method of

distributing church power came into question in the early 1990s. In

Save, for example, while the patrimonial structure gave the cure and

a few other parish leaders considerable power and forced people depen- dent upon them to offer them deference, as well as bribes and kick-

backs, it also created considerable public resentment. While people I

interviewed in Save recognized that the church there did help orphans, widows, and single mothers, many complained that only those who

paid bribes or had family connections were assisted. Frustration with

what they perceived as corruption led some people to question the spiritual legitimacy of the Catholic Church. The Protestant churches near

Save-Baptist, Pentecostal, Seventh Day Adventist, and Presbyterian- had attracted a substantial number of discontented Catholics. For exam-

ple, one man who converted to the Seventh Day Adventist church had

formerly been the head of a basic Christian community in the Save

Catholic parish and was alienated in part by the patrimonial system in

which he participated:

When I was Catholic, I worked for the Church helping the poor. We gave them clothes, food, blankets, and even that house over there of a widow was built with help from the church. I'm the one who advised them that there was a woman who needed help.

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In reality, I myself profited as well. People gave me beer, money, or came to work in my field so that they could stay on the list.'4

While some people expressed their frustration with corrupt parishes like Save by leaving, many others, not only in Save, but in Catholic

and Protestant parishes throughout the country, sought to reform the

churches from within. Some pastors, priests, and others within the

churches had been influenced by liberation theologies to see the churches

as instruments of social change, and they increasingly questioned the

morality of patrimonial structures both in society at large and within

the churches. People influenced by other theological movements, such

as the charismatic Abarokore movement in the Protestant churches and

the Marian movement in the Catholic Church, also questioned the

immorality they saw within the churches and presented an alternative

vision of church life. As church economic development programs in-

creased, they also became an important source of opposition to church

corruption. As Peter Uvin (1998) has effectively demonstrated, devel-

opment assistance in Rwanda frequently did more to reinforce existing social inequalities than to help the poor, but churches were among the

first organizations to embrace the more effective principles of sustain-

able development. With the relatively modest size of church projects, the active intervention of donors, and a theologically based commit-

ment on the part of many church development workers to assist the

least fortunate, church projects were more likely to realize the goal of

empowering the masses. International church partners, like the Dutch

Reformed Church and the American group Catholic Relief Services, used their financial power to urge reform within the churches, both in

the area of development and in church operations. In addition, many

people who were excluded from the state sphere-both Tutsi and pro-

gressive Hutu--found a haven in the churches, where they felt they had a better chance of gaining influence." These developments in the

churches in the late 1980s and early 1990s led not only to significant church support for democratic reforms in Rwanda, but also produced substantial pressures for reform within the churches that challenged the

established system of church authority. Many church leaders were ulti-

mately sympathetic to the genocide because it could help to bolster their

power and prcserve their hold on office against this movement for reform.

The Churches and the Genocide

The complex conditions and events that led to the genocide have

been well documented elsewhere. 16 Although initial press reports depicted

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the violence as an almost inevitable consequence of primordial social

divisions, in fact, as Des Forges argues, 'this genocide was not an uncon-

trollable outburst of rage by a people consumed by "ancient tribal

hatreds"' (Des Forges 1999). Problems of overpopulation, poverty, and

gross income disparity created a disaffected population, susceptible to

manipulation by extremist elements," but ultimately, 'This genocide resulted from the deliberate choice of a modern elite to foster hatred

and fear to keep itself in power' (Des Forges 1999). Feeling their con-

trol of society threatened by both political and military challenges, a

coterie of Hutu politicians, military officers, and businesspeople chose

genocide as a strategy to eliminate opponents and regain popular sup-

port. An unpopular peace accord with the Tutsi-dominated Rwandan

Patriotic Front (RPF), the assassination of the Hutu president of Burundi

by Tutsi military officers in October 1993, and ultimately the death of President Habyarimana and the renewal of war with the RPF made the idea of a 'Tutsi threat' believable. By sanctioning ethnic discrimi-

nation and exclusion and urging support for the organizers of the genocide, Rwanda's Christian churches helped make the slaughter of the

country's Tutsi minority morally permissible. In the years leading up to the genocide, churches contributed both

to the movement for democratic political reform and to the con-

servative reaction, which relied heavily on ethnic scapegoating. After

winning strong public support during his first decade in office by

maintaining order and attracting international investment, President

Habyarimana found his popularity deteriorating by the mid-1980s.

Intensifying population density contributed to problems such as over-

cultivation and declining soil fertility and increasing landlessness. The

price of coffee, Rwanda's chief export, collapsed in the mid-1980s, con-

tributing to the hardship of farmers but also threatening the economic

position of the small middle class. In this context of scarcity, official

corruption became increasingly irksome to the population. In 1988, the

Catholic monthly newspaper Kinyamateka helped inspire the emergence of a free press by speaking out openly about the enrichment of public officials and exposing the serious economic problems in the coun-

try, including a famine in the south. Thc many new newspapers and

journals that appeared in the next several years helped channel public discontent with the regime into calls for democratic reform. The demo-

cratic movement in Rwanda was never more than a loose congeries of

journalists, civil society activists, politicians from the former Kayibanda

regime, and others frustrated at the continuation of authoritarian rule,

but, by early 1990, a range of groups and individuals, many of them

177

affiliated with the churches, were calling for respect for civil rights, the

legalization of opposition parties, and free and fair elections. Many Tutsi joined in this protest, because of frustration over their continued

political exclusion, as did southern Hutu, who objected to the domi-

nation of the government and military by Hutu from Habyarimana's home region in the north. Church support was key to the foundation

of several human rights groups, and pastors, priests, and lay church

leaders actively supported farmers' cooperatives, women's groups, stu-

dent associations, and other organizations that began to push for civil

rights, government accountability, and democratic constitutional changes. Even the Catholic bishops, generally close allies of the regime, issued

a three-part letter in advance of an October 1990 papal visit that de-

nounccd corruption and regional and ethnic discrimination and called

for free speech. Under this growing pressure, Habyarimana announced

that he would institute reforms to democratize the system, but an

invasion in October by the RPF changed the political equation, both

adding pressure for reform and providing a basis for Habyarimana to regain public support (Newbury 1992; Reyntjens 1994: 103-104;

Longman 1997). Over the next four years, Habyarimana and his supporters operated

along two political tracks. On the one hand, they followed through on

the President's promise to implement structural political reforms, which

served to undercut their opponents and appeased their critics both at

home and abroad. Habyarimana announced in July 1990 that Rwanda

would become a multi-party democracy and that he would create a

commission to determine the best means to accomplish this transition.

In June 1991, the national legislature adopted the new constitution pro-

posed by this commission, which created a post of prime minister and

changed Rwanda from a single-party to multi-party state. Over the

next several months a number of new opposition parties emerged, the

three largest of which formed a coalition to pressure Habyarimana to

name a multi-party 'government of national unity'. When Habyarimana

appointed an MRND prime minister who named a cabinet in which

all but one minister was from the MRND, the former single party, the

opposition coalition organized a protest campaign. In March 1992,

Habyarimana agreed to name a prime minister from an opposition

party and to divide cabinet positions evenly between his supporters and

the opposition (Reyntjens 1994: 103-117; Prunier 1995: 127-150). At the same time that they offered these concessions, Habyarimana

and his allies sought to undermine the reforms, delegitimize the opposition, and regain popularity largely through a strategy that I call 'organ-

178

izing chaos' (Longman 1998b). Supporters of the regime sought to

sow disorder in the society to discredit the democratization process. Soldiers and members of the MRND, particularly its youth wing, the

Interahamwe, broke up opposition party rallies and harassed opposition

politicians and civil society activists. After the multi-party government took office, the soldiers and MRND youths participated increasingly in

simple criminal activity, such as armed robbery, which contributed to

a sense of general insecurity. Allies of the regime also sought to raise

ethnic tensions by organizing massacres of Tutsi in various parts of the

country, beginning immediately after the RPF invasion in October 1990.

As the war with the RPF expanded, a group of extremist Hutu asso-

ciates of the president and his wife turned increasingly to fostering ethnic paranoia among the Hutu masses so that they could portray themselves as the defenders of Hutu interests and the opposition as

dupes of the Tutsi. The extremists warned that a conspiracy of Tutsi

both inside and outside the country was seeking to reverse the 1959

revolution and again subjugate the Hutu population. With the RPF

attacking Rwanda, displacing hundreds of thousands of people, the idea

of a Tutsi conspiracy seemed reasonable to many Rwandans."

The peace accord signed between the government and the RPF in

Arusha, Tanzania, in August 1993 became a rallying point for reac-

tionary forces. They argued that the accord gave too much power to

the Tutsi and the RPF and sold out Hutu interests. In the next few

months, many Hutu politicians deserted the opposition and allied with

the president, leaving Tutsi as the most conspicuous opponents of the

regime. The murder in October 1993 of Burundi's first Hutu president, Melchior Ndadaye, by Tutsi troops attempting a coup, reinforced

fears in Rwanda that Tutsi could not be trusted, and the thousands of

Burundian Hutu refugees who arrived in Rwanda contributed to the

growing anti-Tutsi sentiments. At some point during this period, a group of extremists linked to the president drew up plans for genocide of the

Tutsi living in Rwanda as a way of eliminating opposition and unify-

ing the Hutu behind their regime. The death of President Habyarimana on April 6, 1994, served as the spark to put these plans into motion

(Des Forges 1999: 96-179; Prunier 1995: 159-212). The role that churches played in supporting the emergence of the

democracy movement in Rwanda in the early 1990s, with many of the

activists coming out of church organizations, has been widely recognized (cf. Reyntjens 1994: 166-170; Prunier 1995: 132-133), but the

pressures that arose for democratization within the churches have received

less notice. Just as President Habyarimana and his associates found their

179

hold on power challenged by opposition activists who exposed their

corruption and questioned their authority, church leaders from the

national to the local level found their own authority under question.

Lay movements like the Abarokore movement and the Marian move-

ment that emerged in response to the apparitions of the Virgin Mary at Kibeho challenged the clergy's monopoly on religious teaching and

ritual. Successful development projects reduced the dependence of the

poor on patrimonial structures and created a group solidarity that provided the support necessary to oppose injustice. Progressive intellectu-

als who found support in various sectors of the churches for human

rights activism and other causes criticized the wider church structures

and national leadership for failing to assist them. Various voices within

the churches called for greater empowerment of the laity and organized challenges to the existing church authorities. Even the chair of

the Catholic Conference of Bishops, Thadee Nsengiyumva, issued a

pastoral letter in January 1991 that accused the Catholic Church of

being a 'giant with feet of clay,' unwilling to use its power for good, and called upon the church to reform its own structures." In the Save

parish, increasingly vocal discontent with the operations of the parish seem to have been a factor in the bishop's replacement of the cure

with a Tutsi priest in 1993.

Church support for the 1994 genocide can be better understood

within this context of church authority structures under challenge. National church leaders had a closc, mutually beneficial working rela-

tionship with national political official, just as local pastors and priests often had a close relationship with local authorities. Church personnel had a vested interest in preserving the political status quo and resist-

ing reforms, not simply because of personal ties with political officials, but also because of the benefits they gained from their cooperative rela-

tionship with office holders. Yet it was the direct challenges to their own authority within the churches that made church leaders truly sym-

pathetic to the idea of a 'Tutsi menace' that associates of Habyarimana

began to promulgate after the 1990 invasion by the RPF. Because they owed their power at least in part to ethnic politics within the churches, church leaders perceived the threats to their power partially in ethnic

terms. With Tutsi and moderate Hutu apparently trying to wrest con-

trol of church structures, national and local church leaders were eas-

ily convinced of a grand conspiracy to reverse the 1959 revolution-

which would include reversing their own control of the churches. In

ultimately supporting the genocide, church personnel understood the

attack on Tutsi and their allies as a struggle in part to protect churches

180

from attacks on their structures and as an attempt to preserve their

own power.

During the period of pro-democracy mobilization, church leaders

took a mixed public stance. On the one hand, hoping not to lose their own legitimacy with church members, they acknowledged the need for

greater democracy and respect for civil rights in the country, but at

the same time, a number of leaders made clear their strong support for Habyarimana and their opposition to the RPF. During the build

up to the genocide, a few national church leaders spoke out-for exam-

ple, the bishop of Nyundo who warned in November 1993 of arms

being distributed to civilian militias-but most continued a close alliance

with the regime. None of Rwanda's churches specifically denounced

the ethnic massacres that took place periodically between 1990 and

January 1993. Des Forges (1999: 87) discusses these attacks as 'prac- ticing slaughter', since they established the pattern eventually used in

the genocide. This was certainly true for the churches, since the silence

of church leaders in the face of attacks even on church personnel and

buildings set the pattern of later church response to ethnic violence.

Because they did not speak out against the anti-Tutsi violence and the

growing propaganda being broadcast throughout the country, but on

the contrary displayed their own anti-`I'utsi prejudices, the church leaders' continued call for support of the regime in a time of war was inter-

preted by the public as an endorsement of the anti-Tutsi message. With

the long history of church alliance with the government and the con-

tinuing practice of ethnic discrimination within the churches, many Rwandan Christians came to believe that organizing to defend against

potential Tutsi treachery was consistent with well established church

practice. As a result, at the local level, many church employees and

lay leaders became members of the militias that were organizing to

defend the country from the supposed Tutsi menace. In communities like Save, most of those who attacked the church buildings where Tutsi

were gathered were themselves members of the parish. When the genocide began, some individuals in the churches took

courageous stands, even risking their lives to save those threatened, but

the majority of people in the churches gave tacit or even open sup-

port to the genocide. Church officials lent credibility to those organ-

izing the genocide by calling on their members to support the new

government. A month into the violence, after most of the major mas-

sacres were already finished, the Catholic bishops and leaders of Protestant

churches did issue a joint call for the restoration of peace and secu-

rity, but they treated the violence as a mere product of the war, accus-

181

ing each side equally, without ever using the term genocide or even

alluding to the systematic slaughter of Tutsi civilians (Des Forges 1999:

25-248; African Rights 1995: 862-930). The church officials never

specifically invoked the principle of sanctuary nor condemned the des-

ecration of church buildings. It is not surprising, then, that most

Rwandans believed that their church leaders supported the massacres.

Knowing the position of church leaders and the history of ethnic

politics in the churches, many of Rwanda's Christians became involved

in the killing without offending their religious beliefs. Individuals used

the violence as a means of asserting their personal power, and this

included people seeking to improve their positions within the churches.

Clergy and other church leaders were often killed by members of their

own parishes. Leaders of militia groups or roadblocks became powerful figures who could exercise authority in the churches as in other

spheres of social life, and conversely powerful people in local commu-

nities often asserted their power by leading such groups. Evidence that

I gathered in 1995-96 in the prefectures of Gikongoro, Butare, and

Kibuye is consistent with reports from other sources throughout the

country that a number of clergy and other church employees lured

people into churches knowing that they would be killed, turned over

Tutsi to be killed, and themselves participatcd in or even led the secu-

rity patrols that served as death squads" Several priests have been

found guilty in Rwandan courts of participation in the genocide, and

a regional leader of the Seventh Day Adventist Church, Elziphan Ntakirutimana, has even been extradited to stand trial at the International

Criminal Tribunal in Arusha (African Rights 2000). Many clergy did

not participate directly in the violence but took part in the local and

regional security committees that were set up to organize roadblocks

and militia patrols. Church personnel involved in the violence justified the killing as a

defensive action made necessary by the RPF invasion. They saw the

death of Tutsi civilians as an unfortunate necessity of the war, because

of thc legitimate concern of Hutu for their safety. Even once the genocide was over and the genocidal regime was driven from power, some

church personnel refused to acknowledge the nature of the offenses that

had taken place. In August 1994, a group of priests wrote to the Vatican

from exile in Congo to defend their position: To speak of genocide and to insinuate that only Hutus killed Tutsis is to be igno- rant that Hutus and Tutsis have been cach others' executioners. We dare even to confirm that the number of Hutu civilians killed by the army of the RPF exceeds by far the number of Tutsi victims of the ethnic troubles (quoted in African Rights 1995: 906).

182

Exiled leaders of the Presbyterian church made the same argument more than two years later at a 'reconciliation' meeting held in Namibia.2' I

Concluding Thoughts on the 77ieologv of Genocide

Christians around the world who have heard the accusations against the churches in Rwanda have tended to dismiss the reprehensible actions

of clergy and other Christians as evidence of the superficiality of

Christianity in Rwanda.22 Such a response not only ignores the long

history of Christian violence conducted in the name of God, from the

Crusades to the repeated persecution of Jews, but it also overlooks the

ways in which Christianity in Africa has been shaped by the colonial

experience. Arguments by scholars such as Lamin Sanneh (1990) about

the innovation Africans used in adapting the Christian message to their

own cultures notwithstanding, the nature of missionary work as part of

the colonial project affected not only the structures of the Christian

churches established in Africa, as I have described above, but also the

Christian message. In Rwanda, missionaries emphasized obedience and

respect for authorities and for power structures. Christians were taught to follow strictly the rules of the faith as well as the orders of their

social superiors and their government. Missionaries showed through

example that Christianity allowed Machiavellian manipulations in the

struggle for influence and accepted ethnic discrimination. Even after

independence, Christianity in Rwanda rcmained predominantly a legal- istic religion that emphasized authority and obedience and continued

to practice political maneuvering and discrimination. While the churches

did not preach ethnic hatred and murder as such, charity and love for

fellow humans had never been the dominant message, and supporting the genocide was ultimately consistent with the theology that Christians

had been taught. As Paul Gifford (1998) has emphasized, 'different Christianities' exist

simultaneously in Africa (325-333). Rwanda was not unique in having

competing voices within its churches, some preaching a conservative

theology of obedience while others called for churches to become agents of progressive social change. In the Rwandan case, however, the conflict

between the alternate voices within the churches became highly politi- cized, as conservative forces sought to protect both their personal power and their vision of the church against the growing power of the voices

seeking to democratize the churches. This conflict, as much as the

strong church-state alliance, helps to explain why churches became

involved in genocide.

183

What the Rwandan case suggests for the study of religion and politics in Africa is the need to take seriously political conflicts within

churches. Churches are not politically relevant only in relationship to

the state. With their extensive resources, myriad programs, and wide

geographic reach, churches play a major role in many African societies

in determining the distribution of wealth and opportunities, the struc-

ture of class divisions, and the nature of ethnic power relations. Individuals

and groups use churches to promote their interests, and the results of

political competitions within churches can have wide-reaching implica- tion for the broader society. The struggle to democratize churches has

been an important element of the political reform movements that have

swept across Africa in the past decade but has gone almost unnoticed

by political analysts. The Rwandan case shows the danger of such

neglect.

NOTES

1. Interview in Kigali, March 1996. 2. Much of the research for this article was gathered during field research in Rwanda

in 1992-93 and 1995-96. 3. I have written extensively elsewhere on the role of churches in shaping ethnic

identities, cf. Longman 1999 and Longman 2000. 4. This fact distinguishes the Rwandan case from Europe under Nazi occupation in

which Jews were demonized in part as Christ-killers, or Turkey in which Armenians were targeted as infidels, or the religious targeting of Muslims in Bosnia and Kosovo. While the actual belief of those targeted was not politically relevant, religious imagery and appeals were used to exclude and isolate mcmbers of the targeted groups, who were accused by their very nature of offending sacred values. In Rwanda, religion was not a factor in defining identity as religious affiliations cut across ethnic lines.

5. As recorded in an interview in Ngoma, Butare, March 26, 1996, and in thc film by Lindsey Hilsum, Rwanda: The Betrayal, Blackstone Films, Channel 4, 1996.

6. The colonial history of the Catholic Church is well documented by Linden and Linden 1977 and Kalibwami 1991.

7. While the precise meaning of the terms in precolonial Rwanda and Burundi remains a matter of academic debate, research suggests that usage of the terms Hutu, Tutsi, and Twa showed considerable regional variation and that the categories were relatively fluid. For example, Newbury (1988: 74-94) and Gravel (1968) demonstrate that, in opposite sides of the Rwandan Kingdom, Hutu families who acquired cattle and clients would be considered Tutsi within a few generations, while Tutsi families who lost their cattle and clients would eventually be considered Hutu. Lemarchand (1994: 42-43) points out that in Burundi the ruling elite were the Ganwa, considered neither Hutu nor Tutsi, a fact which Europeans almost completely ignore.

8. Sanders 1969 offers an excellent analysis of the development of racial ideas regard- ing the 'hamitic hypothesis.' See also, Prunier 1995: 5-16 and Chretien's article "`Vrais" et "faux" N?gres: L'ideologie hamitique', in Chretien 1987.

9. As Linden and Linden write, 'Both Hutu and Tutsi chiefs were able to translate their spiritual authority into a temporal sway over their parishioners. Members of an Abbe's family tendcd to settle around his mission or to find employment there, and as

184

Father Superior he was able to build up a network of clients, often becoming a confidant of the local chief...' (223-224). They argue that from early on Missionaries were inte- grated into Rwanda's patron-client system, with converts attaching themselves to the missions like clients, expecting protection and assistance from the missionaries, whom they viewed as patrons (50-72).

10. On the idea of spiritual power, see Ellis and ter Haar 1998. 11. Significantly, in Burundi, where Tutsi continued to dominate the government,

church leadership remained overwhelmingly Tutsi, particularly in the Catholic Church. 12. Based on interviews conducted in Butare and Kibuye in 1992-93, including with

Muvara, and in Nairobi 1999. See also Muvara 1990. 13. This portrait is drawn from interviews conducted in Save and Butare, December

1992-April 1993, and from diverse church documents found in archives in the cathe- dral in Butare, including 'Statistiques Annuelles Diocese Butare 1990', printed by the diocese.

14. Interview in Save, 5 February 1993. 15. I have written about these developments in greater detail in Longman 2000,

chapter four. 16. The best source on the genocide is the comprehensive report written by histo-

rian Alison Des Forges (1999) for Human Rights Watch based on research gathered by a research team in which I participatcd. See also, Prunier 1995.

17. Uvin 1998 provides the best analysis of the economic factors behind the genocide. 18. On the ideology of' the genocide, see Des Forges 1999: 65-86 and Chreticn 1995:

139-208. 19. For more details see Longman 2000. 20. Some of these findings are presented in Des Forges 1999, others in Longman 2000. 21. Interview by telephone with Kigali, December 1996. 22. The Vatican, for example, has treated the failings of the church in Rwanda as

individual not institutional failings. A 1996 letter claimed that 'The church itself cannot be held responsible for the misdeeds of its mcmbers who have acted against evan- gelical law.' (Quoted in 'Pope Says Church is Not to Blame in Rwanda', New York Times, March 21, 1996, A3).

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Documents

Church Politics and the Genocide in Rwanda